Oxford officially files anti-lobbying protest

City Purchasing Officer James Scarboro broke the news at an Electric Utility Commission meeting on Monday that Oxford Advisors LLC has officially filed a protest to the city’s disqualification, under its anti-lobbying ordinance, of the company’s bid to be the consumer advocate in the upcoming Austin Energy cost-of-service study. Mark Dreyfus, the utility’s vice president of regulatory affairs and corporate communications, noted that Oxford filed the protest on Monday and that the city cannot release a new request for contract proposals while the protest is pending. Prior to that discussion, commission Chair Michael Osborne, whose communication with Oxford prompted the disqualification, offered an additional statement. “This was an inadvertent contact. Had staff contacted me before the determination, which they did not, I would have explained the circumstances to them,” he said. “But more importantly, there was no representation that was related to the response and so therefore there was no violation of the ordinance.”